For A&M and LSU, rivalry is both old and new

Updated 1:15 pm, Thursday, October 18, 2012

Harvey Williams of Hempstead spurned A&M to sign with LSU, then helped the Tigers beat the Aggies 17-3 in 1987.

Harvey Williams of Hempstead spurned A&M to sign with LSU, then helped the Tigers beat the Aggies 17-3 in 1987.

Photo: AP

For A&M and LSU, rivalry is both old and new

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When LSU and Texas A&M line up Saturday at Kyle Field, the Tigers and Aggies of 2012 will inherit a rivalry as old as Paul Dietzel versus Paul Bryant, as rambunctious as the recruiting tales of John David Crow and Harvey Williams, and as consequential as Sunday's BCS standings.

Saturday's game will be the 51st in a series that dates to the 19th century and was played 26 times in the 36 seasons between 1960 and 1995. This, however, will be the first Southeastern Conference game between the two, and it has special meaning for old hands on both sides.

"The young kids today don't know the depth and the tradition and how heated up things used to be," said Williams, whose decision to pick LSU over A&M in the mid-1980s remains one of the great tales of Texas football recruiting lore. "I'm anxious to see how things will develop."

Said former A&M coach R.C. Slocum: "There are so many ties because of the oil industry between Texas and Louisiana and so many people who have moved back and forth. It makes for a mixture of friends and families that will add a lot of meaning to this game. It will become a big one overnight, I have no doubt."

This will be the sixth time, including last year's Cotton Bowl, in which both teams are ranked in the Top 25 at kickoff. But since the loser likely will be eliminated from the SEC West title race, it arguably packs more potential punch than any of the 50 preceding matchups.

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"This place will be at fever pitch," A&M coach Kevin Sumlin said Wednesday. "With us moving into the SEC and not playing Texas anymore (and) because of the proximity of the two schools, it's just a natural big game.

"I don't know that you can ever replace a rivalry, but it certainly becomes a big game in the eyes of our fan base."

Border war erupts

Among the senior observers of Saturday's game will be Crow, who played on the 1955-56 A&M teams that beat the Tigers, and Dietzel, who split four games against the Aggies as the Tigers' head coach from 1955 through 1961.

As is the case with every decent SEC story, Bryant figures heavily into the mix.

Dietzel was on Bryant's coaching staff at Kentucky in 1951-52. (Dietzel, 88, says Bryant called him Pablo "because there was room for only one Paul.") Crow left his hometown of Springhill, La., near the Arkansas border, when Bryant came to A&M in 1954 and hired Elmer Smith, who had coached Crow's older brother, as one of his assistants.

Even so, Dietzel said, "I didn't like having to play against John David very much. When I came to LSU, I had a long talk with (Bryant) about recruiting, and I'm proud to say that he never got another player out of Louisiana while I was there.

"It's a great series. We had some fine games with them."

The series means a lot to Crow as well. A&M and LSU played from 1960 through 1975 at Baton Rouge, where the Tigers built a 12-3-1 series advantage. When Crow returned to A&M as an assistant to coach/athletic director Jackie Sherrill in 1983, he pushed for the revival of the series in 1986 as a home-and-home affair.

A&M turns the tables

The Aggies enjoyed considerably more success from there. Sherrill was 0-3 against LSU, but Slocum dominated the Tigers beginning in 1989, winning five of six meetings.

"The 1989 game was my first as head coach, and (LSU) was ranked No. 7, so I came into the game all jacked up," Slocum said. "Then comes the opening kickoff, and Larry Horton runs it back a hundred yards for a touchdown for us. I'm thinking, 'There's not too much to this being a head coach, is it?'"

That game still makes Slocum smile, and so does his memory of a subsequent trip to Baton Rouge.

"I always enjoyed going there. Riding on the bus from the hotel to the stadium in Baton Rouge was a thrill," Slocum said. "I always reminded our players that we were going into a hostile environment and that their fans would be yelling and throwing stuff.

"One year, we're about to pull into a stadium, and we pass four guys in a pickup truck. As the bus goes by, all four of them pull their pants down and moon us. I could hear the whole bus breaking out into laughter watching those four guys on that truck."

One who got away

One reason Sherrill's teams had trouble against LSU was the presence of Williams, the all-state blue-chipper from Hempstead who everyone knew was a dead-lock cinch to sign with the Aggies - until his signing day news conference, where he announced he had picked LSU.

"In my mind, A&M was Hempstead," Williams said Wednesday. "USC was too far away, and Notre Dame was too cold. I loved A&M. If A&M had been in Baton Rouge, I would have gone there. But I wanted to get away from home."

Williams ran for 70 yards in 1987 in the Tigers' first game at Kyle Field since 1945. After LSU's 17-3 win, he said, "My grandmother probably could have gotten that yardage with the holes I had."

These days, Williams lives in Spring and coaches two junior-high-age select teams. One of his best players is his son, Tyson, who he figures will someday wind up at LSU … or maybe A&M.

Williams will be at a family funeral Saturday and won't be able to attend the game, but he expects big things from the Aggies and Tigers.

"I love that they're playing again," he said. "I still bleed purple and gold, but I watch the Aggies too. This will be a great tradition. It's already set in stone."